[Final Blogpost] An Authentic Happiness

 

An Authentic Happiness

(H01) Thomas Morowsky

Is there a correct way to be happy? Given that everyone has their own things that make them happy—certain activities, objects, or even mindsets, to name a few—that can be a tricky question. All of us have different things we like or dislike; sometimes overlapping or, just as if not more commonly the case, not. But for the wide range of agreeable and disagreeable things in life that bring happiness and unhappiness, there are some things that people can agree on as a basis for this happiness.

Do we want happiness to simply be handed to us freely? At a glance this sounds like an easy question to answer, but certain specifics can make it not quite as easy to choose one way or another. For example, we can look to the Experience Machine, a thought experiment proposed by Robert Nozick against the primary thesis of hedonism. If we could simply plug into a machine that takes care of us forever, keeps us infinitely happy, and has us not need to truly do a thing, would that be best? It's easy to imagine. Think of being able to experience whatever makes you happy forever without ever growing bored: that nice feeling when you wake up on an early morning when you're wrapped up in warm blankets and don't have anything telling you to get ready for the day, or maybe when you're comfortable on your couch enjoying a movie with company. As pleasant as the opportunity to just be handed happiness may sound, many would be inclined to disagree that this is the correct way to achieve happiness. As is pointed out in the comments of comic writer Merryweather’s somber adaptation of the thought experiment, 

I wrote a comic about the fate of humanity! pic.twitter.com/FxTDhyixZ7

— Merryweather Comics (@Merryweatherey) October 19, 2019

“This isn't meaningful - your happiness isn't earned through challenge.” Similar to this happens to be the scenario of The Matrix's Red/Blue Pill debate: "Is it better to free your mind? Or live in blissful ignorance?" In the movie Neo chose the red pill of facing reality and all of its cruelties, but it can't be denied that there are certainly people who would be willing to enter either scenario's equivalent of being promised eternal happiness or blissful ignorance. There are many still who would, however, be evasive due to a lack of meaning and challenge to the happiness being provided in such a life

 Rejecting the Experience Machine is to say that happiness shan't given freely—as if that was ever realistic in the first place—but rather through other meaningful things and with certain necessities to it. This can be where views vary as most of everyone tends to believe in a specific way to reach happiness, such as following a certain religion, partaking in certain activities, or otherwise living a certain way. Ultimately those small details are subjective and for the individual to figure out for themselves (as was previously stated, we all like/dislike certain things). But through understanding the gist of what makes people happy, can an understanding be reached for how to best achieve it? As a pioneer of

"Positive Psychology", psychologist Martin Seligman (Pictured on left) would be inclined to think so. In his theory of Authentic Happiness, Seligman splits happiness into three separate types: the Pleasant Life, the Good Life, and the Meaningful Life. While the Pleasant Life focuses on savoring pleasures and the Good Life on engaging in actions aligned with our strengths and virtues, both staying within the realms of subjective hedonism, it's the Meaningful Life that "adds one more component: using these same strengths to forward knowledge, power, or goodness." This isn't to say daily pleasantries and other such enjoyments aren't happiness, but that happiness "is not just about obtaining momentary subjective states. Happiness also includes the idea that one's life has been authentic." In short, happiness isn't just the chasing of pleasantries as the Experience Machine's idea would lead one to believe, even if you couldn't tell the difference from the inside (or didn't want to). It goes deeper, with an authentic happiness coming from dedicating one's unique skills in life to something that might outlast them. Such a stance would be agreeable by William James, who once stated that to do such is even "The greatest use of life." With Seligman's stance, it would seem that authenticity is a virtue in the search of happiness beyond freely given alternatives and experiences.

Which would be truly preferable? A happiness handed to you through a machine, or one you make for yourself in reality? In a way, the answer to this question truly depends on seeing beyond one’s own life. In a short term, viewing only one’s lifespan and not thinking of anything that may or may not come over, it can be believed that the Experience Machine’s ideology of pursuing sheer happiness as much as possible is correct. After all, with no afterlife or time to look back on one’s life that they chose to live and instead living in the moment, a joyful and ecstatic life is preferable if it can be obtained. But alternatively, a more thoughtful life would seek Seligman’s authentic happiness. A happiness that utilizes an individual’s unique virtues to leave an impact on the world that outlasts them would, both in terms of practicality/accessibility and in theory of an afterlife, bring more happiness beyond life. As we are unable to objectively know if one way or another is true, however, it once again becomes the individual’s choice to determine how they should live.

Which do you believe is best? A meaningful, accomplished life of ups and downs, or a less fulfilling one of nothing but static pleasure? Does a merit of authenticity in your happiness matter to you?